Exclamation Points Quotes

She wrote to him fairly regularly, from a paradise of triple exclamation points and inaccurate observations. ~ J.D. Salinger

Never use three exclamation points when one will do. ~ Christine Edwards

People complain about my exclamation points, but I honestly think that's the way people think. I don't think people think in essays; it's one exclamation point to another. ~ Tom Wolfe

Five exclamation marks, the sure sign of an insane mind. ~ Terry Pratchett

This is what they mean by epiphanies. I am almost thinking in exclamation points. ~ Claire Hennessy

If you've spent any time trolling the blogosphere, you've probably noticed a peculiar literary trend: the pervasive habit of writers inexplicably placing exclamation points at the end of otherwise unremarkable sentences. Sort of like this! This is done to suggest an ironic detachment from the writing of an expository sentence! It's supposed to signify that the writer is self-aware! And this is idiotic. It's the saddest kind of failure. F. Scott Fitzgerald believed inserting exclamation points was the literary equivalent of an author laughing at his own jokes, but that's not the case in the modern age; now, the exclamation point signifies creative confusion. All it illustrates is that even the writer can't tell if what they're creating is supposed to be meaningful, frivolous, or cruel. It's an attempt to insert humor where none exists, on the off chance that a potential reader will only be pleased if they suspect they're being entertained. Of course, the reader isn't really sure, either. They just want to know when they're supposed to pretend to be amused. All those extraneous exclamation points are like little splatters of canned laughter: They represent the "form of funny," which is more easily understood (and more easily constructed) than authentic funniness. ~ Chuck Klosterman

A kiss can be a comma, a question mark, or an exclamation point. Thats basic spelling that every woman ought to know. ~ Mistinguett

Mario, I wrote, to give myself courage, had not taken away the world, he had taken away only himself. And you are not a woman of thirty years ago. You are of today, take hold of today, don't regress, don't lose yourself, keep a tight grip. Above all, don't give into distracted or malicious or angry monologues. Eliminate the exclamation points. He's gone, you're still here. You'll no longer enjoy the gleam of his eyes, of his words, but so what? Organize your defenses, preserve your wholeness, don't let yourself break like an ornament, you're not a knickknack, no woman is a knickknack. La femme rompue, ah, rompue, the destroyed woman, destroyed, shit. My job, I thought, is to demonstrate that one can remain healthy. Demonstrate it to myself, no one else. If I am exposed to lizards, I will fight the lizards. If I am exposed to ants, I will fight the ants. If I am exposed to thieves, I will fight the thieves. If I am exposed to myself, I will fight myself. ~ Elena Ferrante

She thought in exclamation points ~ L.M. Montgomery

I will dance a little. I will move with the wind. I will give my body to my love and celebrate that we have substance beyond the idea of ourselves. We can move. We can touch. This is my physical exclamation point. This is how I can awaken my mind to the possibilities in the day. ~ Mary Anne Radmacher

That first bite of fat-streaked tuna sushi was a culinary epiphany. It was as though I had been wearing a mitten on my tongue all those years and had suddenly taken it off. The velvety fish had a rare beef-like core surrounded by a creamy richness from the marbled fat. The lightly vinegared rice and earthy soy were like exclamation points at the end of a perfect sentence. The wasabi added a final unexpected prickle of heat that kindled my desire for more. That night I promised myself that one day I would eat sushi in Japan. ~ Victoria Abbott Riccardi

I used to enjoy using dots where they would be least expected, not at the end of a sentence but in the middle, creating the effect ... of a skipped beat. It seemed to me the mind reacted - first! ... in dots, dashes, and exclamation points, then rationalized, drew up a brief, with periods. ~ Tom Wolfe

Men can't use exclamation points in texts... it's weird. We also don't say [stuff] like 'yay'. ~ Jacinta Howard

Exclamation points are the most irritating of all. Look! they say, look at what I just said! How amazing is my thought! It is like being forced to watch someone else's small child jumping up and down crazily in the center of the living room shouting to attract attention. If a sentence really has something of importance to say, something quite remarkable, it doesn't need a mark to point it out. And if it is really, after all, a banal sentence needing more zing, the exclamation point simply emphasizes its banality! ~ Lewis Thomas

Maxine will sometimes compliment us on our hair or other aspects of our scruffy appearance. The next day, or even later the same day, she'll send an all-caps e-mail asking why a certain form is not on her desk. This will prompt a peppy reply, one barely stifling a howl of fear:

Hey Maxine!
The document you want was actually put in your in-box yesterday around lunchtime. I also e-mailed it to you and Russell. Let me know if you can't find it!
Thanks!
Laars

P.S. I'm also attaching it again as a Word doc, just in case.

There's so much wrong here: the fake-vague around lunchtime, the nonsensical Thanks, the quasi-casual postscript. The exclamation points look downright psychotic. ~ Ed Park

God is not an exclamation point. He is, at his best, a semicolon, connecting people, and generating what Aldous Huxley called "human grace." Somewhere along the way, we've lost sight of this. ~ Eric Weiner

Love the overuse of exclamation points!!!! Yes!!! They add a lot of emphasis!!! to what your character is saying!!! ~ L.R.W. Lee

Elmore Leonard's Ten Rules of Writing
1. Never open a book with weather.
2. Avoid prologues.
3. Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue.
4. Never use an adverb to modify the verb "said" ... he admonished gravely.
5. Keep your exclamation points under control. You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose.
6. Never use the words "suddenly" or "all hell broke loose."
7. Use regional dialect, patois, sparingly.
8. Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.
9. Don't go into great detail describing places and things.
10. Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.
My most important rule is one that sums up the 10.
If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it. ~ Elmore Leonard

Fundamentalist s live life with an exclamation point. I prefer to live my life with a question mark. ~ Amos Oz

Speak and live in simple sentences. Bring closure
put a period to
those experiences that you don't want to carry on forever and ever. Use commas in those places where you're still growing ... and use exclamation points at the end of every lesson. ~ Iyanla Vanzant

I mean, you don't just love people, you must LOVE them with exclamation points. ~ Ray Bradbury

Cut out all these exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke. ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

A pretty face had been damaged by acne scars and she wore and extra forty pounds on her frame like a threat. Her eyes were dull with anger disguised as apathy. If she kept on her current path, she'd grow into the type of person who fed her kids Doritos for breakfast and purchased angry bumper stickers with lots of exclamation points. But right now, she was just another in a long line of pissed-off small-town girls with a shitty outlook. ~ Dennis Lehane

The night is falling down around us. Meteors rain like fireworks, quick rips in the seam of the dark ... Every second, another streak of silver glows: parentheses, exclamation points, commas - a whole grammar made of light, for words too hard to speak. ~ Jodi Picoult

If you think reading a book is hard, you should try writing one. Because it's even harder. It's still not as hard as writing a game, though. If you discount the purely visual pop-up parts, a book is made almost entirely of words. As a novelist, you just need to think of a few decent strings of words and then fill the other 98% of the book with more or less random descriptions of things and exclamation points. ~ Erik Wolpaw

Okay, so first we get you a new computer and then a Facebook page. Priorities, you know," he said, typing in Kyle's password.

"What would I do without you--"

"Found her," he interrupted. "She's at Carrie's OK Bar. It's downtown."

"What the hell is Carrie's OK Bar?"

"It's a karaoke bar. Travis, come on."

"Wait, how do you know she's there?"

"She checked in there about twenty minutes ago."

"What does that mean?"

"Oh. Right. Since you left, it's become very important that we all constantly know each other's thoughts, locations, and birthdays."

"That's really stupid. Except for in this one very specific situation. I can't go if her fiancé's there, though. That would be too weird."

"He's not."

"How do you know?"

"Because she put 'Girls' Night' with about five exclamation points after it."

"Are people just asking to be murdered?"

"Pretty much. So are we going? ~ John Corey Whaley

Changing the world, one exclamation point at a time. ~ Jon Glaser

You can't have many exclamation points left,' thought Anne, 'but no doubt the supply of italics is inexhaustible. ~ L.M. Montgomery

I love to accent movement. The eye goes to where the white is - you know, the glove. And the feet, if you're dancing, you can put an exclamation point on your movement if it has a bit of light on it. So I wore the white socks. And for the design of the jacket, I would sit with the people who made the clothes and tell them where I wanted a button or a buckle or a design. ~ Michael Jackson

Every second, another streak of silver glows: parentheses, exclamation points, commas
a whole grammar made of light, for words to hard to speak. ~ Jodi Picoult

Unfortunately for me, there is no volume control for what you write down on a piece of paper. I wish there were, but all you can do is add exclamation points, and that is also not very effective, because if you really know the origin of this symbol, you know that its fifteenth-century meaning was to show admiration or joy. And I wasn't showing admiration or joy. ~ Harrington, Karen

F. Scott Fitzgerald believed inserting exclamation points was the literary equivalent of an author laughing at his own jokes, but that's not the case in the modern age; now, the exclamation point signifies creative confusion. All it illustrates is that even the writer can't tell if what they're creating is supposed to be meaningful, frivolous, or cruel. It's an attempt to insert humor where none exists, on the off chance that a potential reader will only be pleased if they suspect they're being entertained. Of course, the reader isn't really sure, either. They just want to know when they're supposed to pretend to be amused. ~ Chuck Klosterman

One should never use exclamation points in writing. It is like laughing at your own joke. ~ Mark Twain

It's about running wild in a field of exclamation points chasing question marks ~ Natasha Tsakos

When speaking aloud, you punctuate constantly - with body language.
Your listener hears commas, dashes, question marks, exclamation points, quotation marks as you shout, whisper, pause, wave your arms, roll your eyes, wrinkle your brow.
In writing, punctuation plays the role of body language. It helps readers hear the way you want to be heard. ~ Russell Baker

I bet when all the punctuation marks have a party, they quietly look at exclamation point's wife and think, that poor woman. ~ Dana Gould

Note: When reading dry political theory, such as the texts you will find on the following pages, it may be useful to apply the Exclamation Point Test from time to time, to determine if the material you are reading is actually relevant to your life. To apply this test, simply go through the text replacing all the punctuation marks at the ends of the sentences with exclamation points. If the results sound absurd when read aloud, then you know you're wasting your time. ~ CrimethInc.

Marginalia

Sometimes the notes are ferocious,
skirmishes against the author
raging along the borders of every page
in tiny black script.
If I could just get my hands on you,
Kierkegaard, or Conor Cruise O'Brien,
they seem to say,
I would bolt the door and beat some logic into your head.

Other comments are more offhand, dismissive -
Nonsense." "Please!" "HA!!" -
that kind of thing.
I remember once looking up from my reading,
my thumb as a bookmark,
trying to imagine what the person must look like
who wrote "Don't be a ninny"
alongside a paragraph in The Life of Emily Dickinson.

Students are more modest
needing to leave only their splayed footprints
along the shore of the page.
One scrawls "Metaphor" next to a stanza of Eliot's.
Another notes the presence of "Irony"
fifty times outside the paragraphs of A Modest Proposal.

Or they are fans who cheer from the empty bleachers,
Hands cupped around their mouths.
Absolutely," they shout
to Duns Scotus and James Baldwin.
Yes." "Bull's-eye." "My man!"
Check marks, asterisks, and exclamation points
rain down along the sidelines.

And if you have managed to graduate from college
without ever having written "Man vs. Nature"
in a margin, perhaps now
is the time to take one step forward.

We have all seized the white perimeter as our ownBilly Collins

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